Why don’t you like Apple?
Why don’t you like Apple?
Real question. I would like to know what drives you to hate Apple? (In terms of privacy of course because in terms of price it’s another story).
Security theater: All you stuff is encrypted but they have the decryption keys
Proprietary App Store: The apps and the store itself are proprietary and I don't trust Apple.
Gaslighting their customers: Images shared with Android users from iPhone are purposely crushed to a unreviewable quality. The idea is to convince people that Android takes terrible photographs.
I do like their laptops, but for literally everything else: the fact that I basically don’t own my own hardware.
I can’t install or distribute my own software without Apple’s arbitrary approval. When Apple decides it’s done supporting the products, I can’t even install a different OS like Linux because the hardware is completely locked down… they become paper-weights.
That is not how ownership is supposed to work.
Planned obsolescence: the other day I was setting up a refurbished MacBook air from 2017. It officially runs only up to macOS 12. I wanted to install apple's productivity suite iWorks (pages, keynotes, numbers) on it.
But the AppStore said I would need macOS 13 to download and install it. Why the eff doesn't it allow me to install an older version of those apps, and why does the 2017 not support macOS 13?
So I installed Open core Legacy Patcher, built a macOS 13 installer. Installed 13 with absolutely no issues and finally was able to install iWorks.
Any non versed or risk taking user would need to buy a newer Mac... good job apple.
I don't hate Apple in terms of privacy. I hate Apple for a myriad of other reasons. Mostly related to locked down ecosystems.
Seeing as no-one's answering the question in terms of privacy (although I agree with their sentiment)
Trust. You have to trust that they will respect your privacy. They actually talk a good game, are probably superior in privacy to the average android (but not GrapheneOS or Linux) in so much as they fend off other entities trying to hoover your data, mostly so they have exclusive access (at least to metadata, actual data may currently even be secure but that can change and possession is nine tenths and all that). At the end of the day, they're a greedy mega-corporation and cannot be trusted if they need to keep that line going up this quarter. I much prefer transparent systems that keep me in control and possession of my data.
I like their hardware, excellent build quality (shame about long term support and e-waste though). Will probably pick up a cheap M1 Air once Asahi linux stabilises.
I don't like closed systems, vendor lock-in, overpriced tools, or buying equipment that I'll never truly own.
Anti-open(source), anti-open(standards) l, anti-consumer, anti-planet, anti-repair, anti-honest. What else do you need?
Few reasons, first is this:
. Seems like as long as something has a clean interface, or it looks shiny enough, then all its privacy faults are overlooked.Apple also seems to intentionally cultivate and sell their products as privacy-friendly, which is clearly not the case (see image above).
2nd reason is that I had an iphone 2g (one of the first models, I forget which one), and it had bluetooth support. An iOS update broke it, and when I reached out to apple, they lied to me and told me my device had no bluetooth module at all. They're one of the worst offenders of planned obsolescence, and have become one of the richest companies on the planet because of it.
3rd reason: they sell overpriced products to mainly to high-income imperial-core consumers, selling an image of "upper-class professional". Look at a graph of iOS market share worldwide, vs its market share in the richest countries. Apple didn't even bother to condescend to make affordable products for the global south.
The markup on iphones is something outrageous, like 40% of the purchase price is going to the shareholders of apple, not the workers who built the phones. By buying apple, you are mainly supporting these wealthy parasites. Its also why other smartphone brands have higher performance at half the cost of iphones. They really bank on the fact that they're selling an upper-class identity, and less of a phone.
4th reason: Their ecosystem is locked down in such a way as to make it difficult for open source development. iirc apple won't even let you use the GPL for any app on their app store.
Major privacy issues that come to mind include:
- App store lock-in on iOS combined with terms incompatible with the GPL mean that some of the most privacy-respecting software cannot be distributed for Apple's mobile devices.
- Apple proposed, but ultimately did not implement client-side scanning for end-to-end encrypted cloud storage. That such a thing even made it to the public proposal stage shows either incompetence (unlikely) or a lack of serious commitment to privacy (more likely). Apple's proposal may have emboldened EU regulators who are trying to mandate client-side scanning for encrypted chat apps.
- Browser engine lock-in on iOS means hardened third-party browsers are unavailable.
- The popularity of Apple's platform-exclusive iMessage service in the USA may be hindering adoption of cross-platform encrypted messaging. On the other hand, without it perhaps most of its current users would use SMS, which is obviously worse.
Wife spilled some beer in the keyboard. Screen doesn't turn on, it doesn't hold a charge, keyboard doesn't work. But we need sensitive data off the drive.
Take it to their "genius" bar where we are told there is nothing that can be done for the old data and we should just buy a new one.
I take it home, Google a bit and try target disk mode. Et Voila I'm in and can get that data from the hard drive as though it was an external HDD.
Why the Apple "genius" didn't share this option with me? They don't actually care about helping.
And that's the rub with Apple. They don't give a fuck about their users or developers. Just want to herd them around to make more money off their overpriced garbage.
Walled garden, overpriced exploitation of that locked ecosystem ($5000 monitor stand kind of shit), green bubbles/blue bubbles, dominating all tech with their middle of the road/copycat approach where Android was eventually saturated with same type of execs and "gave up" on differentiating until everything was the same sealed back glass rectangle without MICRO SD expansion memory, leading the charge on "brave" feature killing enshitification like removing the headphone jack, plenty more...
Anti-consumer shit like crazy pricing, doing everything they can to discourage repairs, going after third party parts/accessories/service, and how locked down their OSes are. Also, it's ridiculous that they don't have any sort of real enterprise management and IT has to rely on third party stuff (ironic given how Apple can be about third party stuff sometimes).
Walled gardens are antithetical to real privacy.
The fact that they claim to be the most private, but also the most closed, is a contradiction. And that irony doesn't sit well with a lot of people
Locked down proprietary ecosystem that lacks basic support for open standards.
No thanks
- Worst relation price - performance, you pay design not features
- Apple is own by Apple, never by the user
- Not share-friendly with other phones or systems; you are locked within the Apple world, you can't even download a simple mp3 without installing first the iTunes app.
- Almost not repairable
- It's the closest of all closed source, hermetic against all out of the Apple ecosystem.
- Not more private than other
Not supporting the open nature of hardware and software.
Basically it's too much of a hassle to make their software run on other hardware or use other software on their hardware.
They pioneered modern day planned obsolescence, they also popularised unrepairable electronics. They try to block or bastardise any right to repair bills. They force chip distributors to not sell chips they use so their products can't be repaired. They make building applications for Mac at scale a huge pain in the ass and extremely expensive, the solution I recently built wastes insane amounts of power because of the way Apple licenses their stuff. Overall it's a shitty company who fucks poor people in developing nations, fucks the environment and fucks it's customers. I don't care how well it may or may not work, fuck Apple.
Also OSX ui is shit and annoying.
As a citizen of the world its because they are slavers and fuck slavery. One of the biggest lobbiest against fighting slavery too.
Having been friends and family IT though its because they suck. They suck to work on. They suck to devolop for. They suck to run server stuff on. They suck to game on. And they cost an arm and leg for the privilege.
Why not Apple devices?
iPhone does not allow you to have privacy due to its blackbox nature, and is simply a false marketing assurance by Apple to you. Recently, an unpatchable hardware flaw was discovered in Apple's T1 and T2 "security" chips, rendering Apple devices critically vulnerable.
Also, they recently dropped plan for encrypting iCloud backups after FBI complained. They also collect and sell data quite a lot. Siri still records conversations 9 months after Apple promised not to do it. Apple Mail app is vulnerable, yet Apple stays in denial.
Also, Apple sells certificates to third-party developers that allow them to track users, The San Ferdandino shooter publicity stunt was completely fraudulent, and Louis Rossmann dismantled Apple's PR stunt "repair program".
Apple's authorised repair leaked a customer's sex tape during iPhone repair. This is how much they respect your privacy. You want to know how much more they respect your privacy? Apple's Big Sur(veillance) fiasco seemed not enough, it seems. Still not enough to make your eyes pop wide open?
Apple's CSAM mandatory scanning of your local storage is a fiasco that will echo forever. This blog article should be of help. But they lied how their system was never hacked. I doubt. They even removed CSAM protection references off of their website for some reason.
Pretty sure atleast the most coveted privacy innovation of App Tracking protection with one button tracking denial would work, right? Pure. Privacy. Theater.
Surely this benevolent company blocked and destroyed Facebook and Google's ad network ecosystem by blocking all those bad trackers and ads. Sigh. Nope. Now it is just Apple having monopoly over your monetised data.
Also, Android's open source nature is starting to pay off in the long run. Apple 0-day exploits are far cheaper to do than Android.
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I just hate being told what (not) to do. If there is a solution to the problem, fucking let me solve it. I don't need anyone's permission or be told to deal with it just like every other schmuck.
I feel like my intelligence is being personally insulted. Any company deciding that I shouldn't try to repair my phone, which is my property, because they believe I am too retarded to fix it, can suck a dick.
It boils down to two broad categories for me:
- How locked down the OS is on iPhones and iPads. We've seen recent progress (Safari extensions, retro console emulators), but we're still far from a serious OS. iOS still lacks a proper file management system (especially for playing back local audio) and no side-loading is still a deal breaker.
- Obscene markups for easily accessible parts. Apple still believes 8GB RAM is worth $200, and they believe 1TB storage is worth $800. I'd rather just get something with replaceable RAM and storage.
Closed source that pretends to be your friend. They are just wearing a different mask than google, microsoft, facebook, bytedance, and so on. Any privacy gained is a circumstantial side-effect that will cede to any monetary interests and will be used as an excuse to lock users into their walled garden.
Because I want to repair and fix my things without needing special software or proprietary tools. Along with a userbase of American teens who will treat you like shit just based on the phone you have.
I'm so glad I switched away.
- They have their own closed eco system
- They think money is key and throw large amounts at their consumers
- All source code is closed
- They are based in USA
- They love AI
Like what another person said, hate is a strong word. But when it comes to Big Tech, I'm all for the word.
Might have missed adding something to the list. Will add more if I have.
I don't care how nice the sports car is, if it's not going where I want it to, I'm not getting in.
Mostly their marketing practices. They are designed well but mostly designed to keep you locked in one way or another.
For me, their desktop is not as intuitive as people make it seem and lacks simple shortcuts that most other desktops have.
On mobile, its the restriction of customization and options. They are getting better at customizing but still limit you on options for anything outside of their apps. They claim to be private but follow similar practices as other companies, just in a more quite way with better PR.
they make bad products that are media darlings because it's fashion more than anything. they're treated like consumer advocates but they are one of the absolute worst companies for vendor lock-in, and are absolutely anti-consumer, but will have innumerable articles written about how they're "the best" for any given measure. it drives me nuts how the public perception of them is the complete opposite of what they actually are, and i don't get it.
also their software is bad. all due credit their hardware impressed but it doesn't matter if the software is crap.
and they aren't private: they've got all your data but have somehow convinced everyone that it's fine that they have it because they're somehow better than every other large tech company.
- Closed software (and hardware if we count in house arm chips?) ecosystem is bad for security and privacy
- Apple is subject to ancap US corporate law, which means they can realistically do whatever they want with your data (and it would be a bad business decision not to) with no real punishments/business expenses if they're caught
- Large number of users increases interest for state backdoors
- *BSD has mostly the same userland, is totally free, and open source
- Overpriced
- Tim Cook
- Closed ecosystem
- People using Apple devices are usually people that don't know a thing about tech, yet boast about how good Apple is while criticizing other brands, blindly believing the marketing Apple does
- Shitty decisions
- Devices are designed to be as hard as possible to self-repair
- Overpriced
overpriced, jailed
They're more secure (albeit in many wsys security through obscurity) than private, although the privacy aspect is probably among the best you can get by default as far as I can tell. On the other hand, if you're willing to do some relatively simple steps and buy specific hardware, you can achieve better privacy and security on both mobile (graphene) and desktop (qubes) devices.
I personally dislike them for building unrepareable crap, tho.
One of the biggest walled gardens around. Also, they treat users like they’re stupid. No, you can’t do anything with your hardware or software that we don’t want you to. No, you can’t fix it, either. Windows/Linux you’re free to break shit, change whatever you want (not always for windows), repair a system you build yourself, etc. And I despise apple’s perceived “status” and premium pricing. We joke about #pcmasterrace, but there’s some weird social cache around messaging and even dating where you have to have an iPhone to participate. Tf is wrong with people.
Objective c, mostly. 😐
But also the fact that other operating systems run better on their hardware. Linux on apple silicon outperforms macos on that same hardware. A tiny team is porting software to your platform almost completely in the dark.
I'm not a masochist.
Always found their adverts rubbed me the wrong way, the technology as fashion thing. I also considered them the best brand on the planet for how successful their marketing was. Just not for me.
Forcing me to keep updating my OS version, even though it probably isnt that necessary (yes like Windows). Ok there will be perks and nominal security/privacy issues but not sufficient to make me have to replace all my usual software for versions with huge bloat and zero improvement.
The quality of build and user experience are great and def better than even top end Windows machines, but really, is that the deal maker? (I use both Mac and PC units every day.) If you look after a MBPro it will last 20+ years, but the constant 'you cant update something bc your OS is really old (High Sierra in this case) becomes a total PITA, along with battery death etc. My PCs also last a very long time and are very reliable. If they do break they are usually easier to sort out (and much cheaper).
Genius bar is a joke. As a pretty mid range tech person I actually repaired/reinstalled a Yosemite machine myself rather than wait in excess of 14 days to get any help from them and then be charged an arm and a leg. Google was my friend. Cost? Nothing. I got a battery replacement for an old mac laptop from an independent good rep company, cost was about 25% of what Genius bar would have charged.
My next laptop will probably be a Dell or System 76 Linux. Just to experience a fancy Linux build in a posh box.
Not because of their privacy choices, but because they have made it impossible for people to leave their ecosystem, and anyone outside of it can't use anything from apple (not like I would anyway)
I think for most privacy nuts it comes down to “I don’t trust them and it’s closed source. They could be hiding anything in that code.”
And then there’s the people who can’t afford or won’t spend the money it takes to have an enjoyable Apple experience. It genuinely costs multiple thousands of dollars to get into the Apple ecosystem and then it’s massively painful to get out. It’s basically just “corporation bad” because corporations are bad. The only way to be truly private is to not carry a phone at all and use only FOSS solutions.
When I was going through college I had to work as a Microsoft salesperson in the largest commercial shop of my country. Basically I had to sell Windows laptops and ensure every purchase had a Microsoft office attached.
My stand was right next to Apple's and I had a lot of Apple fan boys tease me saying how superior Apple hardware was, how fast and secure everything is. I felt that by having no experience with Apple devices I was not doing my work properly, I couldn't personally disprove their experiences and opinions with my own. I ended up buying a 13 inch MacBook pro for 1300 euros, I believe. Since I worked at the shop they gave me a considerable discount, I'm unsure what the actual retail price was but certainly at least 1800 euros.
I felt robbed, to be honest. Using an Unix like system was nice, I always loved posix shells. Everything else was honesty a terrible experience. Why the hell do I need xcode to do anything? Why does git depend on xcode? Why is xcode no longer available for my machine directly from the store? Why is the store sooooo damn slow? Why am I forced to use Safari's garbage engine, regardless of the browser I choose?
I understand the appeal of having an entire ecosystem of devices that play nice together but MacOS was the only operative system I tried that would actually get on the way of doing work for me personally. For 1300 euros I could have gotten a beast windows laptop at the time, with a nice dedicated GPU instead of that Intel integrated garbage card that can barely play a YouTube video without full speed fans.
A couple of months ago I ended up installing EndeavourOS on this MacBook and it honestly brought this laptop back to life. So much faster and I can finally go back to installing up to date browsers! I have full Java stack running on an up to date intellij IDE and it works nice. A little slow, sure, but fast enough to get work done on emergencies. No more eternal spinning wheel loops.
Hate is a very strong word, I don't hate Apple. I just would not buy or recommend anyone to buy any of their products. They're pretty, tho!
No unlocked bootloader
Can't say anything about privacy because I haven't used their stuff enough, however I have an iPad from 2013 in perfect state that it useless because I can't install anything on it.
I don't hate apple. Especially from a privacy record, they actually have a far superior history than essentially every other hardware manufacturer out there.
I think they're overpriced and I don't agree with some of their design decisions, and in general feel like they could give the consumer more control over things, which is why I don't personally have an iPhone or iPad etc., I use them at work and have nothing against them in general)
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Overpriced, locked down hardware, walled garden software, and a snobbish userbase. I simplify it all down to "I'm not paying 500 more dollars for a logo."
Price is indeed part of it. If I'm paying that much I'm getting repairable and upgradable hardware.
I also hate their walled garden approach to everything. You can do X so long as apple has decided to allow you to do X. Things like no sideloading, no repair/upgradability, etc. I love Framework for instance and would like to see more stuff like it in the future.
And before you ask, yes I hate the other companies that do it too, they don't get a pass but we're talking apple right now.
As far as privacy goes, they're better than windows imo but not by much and it's only because windows is so bad, they still harvest your data but they target the ads instead of selling the data so others can target the ads. That is "better." I guess. I still prefer linux which doesn't even want your data (except anonymized bug reports if you opt in).
I use Mac's at work and whenever I have to use 3rd party accessories (keyboard, mouse, headset, USB switch, etc) that are not apple products they tend to have some issues. I use the same accessories on my personal PC and have never had any issues that unplugging and plugging back in didn't fix. Also I hate that I need to use two USB C to HDMI connectors to have two displays connected to my laptop.
over priced without a single good quality, aside from things that are personal preference like aesthetics and the layout of things and workflows which i also dont like but its whatever, by every objective measure imaginable apple is outdone by their competitors and their competition is cheaper, there is no point to buying anything apple unless u really like the personal preference stuff or ur an apple simp.
Black box.
In terms of privacy of course because in terms of price it’s another story
Top comment:
price
Also none of the comments even bother addressing the actual question.
- Closed ecosystem ( like side loading apps, hardware locked/issues, privacy settings like VPN, browser etc are limited).
Very Pro China, gives away people's privacy in China and are pro censorship, so they don't lose their precious supplier.
Just gonna add a few here, that's related to privacy & censorship
Apple removes Hong Kong protest app, Quartz news app following Chinese criticism https://www.techspot.com/news/82284-apple-removes-hong-kong-protest-app-quartz-news.html
Apple’s Compromises in China: 5 Takeaways https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/17/technology/apple-china-privacy-censorship.html
Apple limited a crucial AirDrop function in China just weeks before protests https://www.cnbc.com/2022/11/30/apple-limited-a-crucial-airdrop-function-in-china-just-weeks-before-protests.html
Apple has stored the data of thousands of customers on Chinese servers and censored apps https://www.businessinsider.com/apple-data-china-censors-apps-nyt-2021-5?op=1
Apple made secret 5-year $275B deal with Chinese government https://appleinsider.com/articles/21/12/07/apple-made-secret-5-year-275b-deal-with-chinese-government
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/04/18/technology/apple-whatsapp-china-app-store.html
Their hardware is just poor. They can charge whatever they like, I'm fortunate enough to not look at prices for that type of kit. Objectively, their hardware sucks compared to many other brands, especially at the same price point.
Their OS sucks for 90% of my use cases. If your "work" involves you just using a browser then yes you can use a big phone to get your work done. Slap an arm in a big case with a keyboard as a "pc" or a big screened arm for a tablet, or a small screen for a phone. But if you do anything where you use a computer, you need an x86 architecture and you need certain hardware capabilities. Over the time, they have all been lacking in performance even at the highest tier, and the price has been high end. Overall makes zero sense. The locked down *nix systems hide everything useful to make it pretty. Isn't compatible with real software. And isn't backwards compatible. I can install windows and my software from the mid 90s or 2000s or today and it just f'cking works. That's why Windows is king. Bloated absolutely. But it just works.
That doesn't make me hate the company. That just makes me sad for the uninformed people that get fooled into spending their hard earned money on sub optimal pieces of kit.
What makes me hate them is this game of "we just invented this new feature from 10 years ago!" and then all their fan bois go apeshit over it like they just stepped into the future. And they're too stupid to know they're being lied to and manipulated for profits. But they are also vocal and arrogant about their stupidity and ignorance, so I don't like them either.
My phone has more RAM, more storage, better screen, better camera, faster charging by an order of magnitude (120W wired, 50W wireless...), more radio transceivers for global connectivity, better battery life, and honestly looks better. There is not a single thing I prefer about an iPhone and there is not a single qualitative metric an iPhone beats my phone on.
My laptop has more RAM, more storage, better screen, better camera, faster and more charging, more ports, upgradability, and is a BEAST that will eat even mid range desktop computers. There is no equivalent Apple product. Not even close. And when you factor in the best and beefiest new macs can't even run my software, it's not even an option. Now my battery life sucks and it looks like a zombie movie prop, but it is actually functional. I can run a simulation or a LLM/ML algo that stresses the CPU at 100%, the Quadro RTX5000 at 100%, and gobbles up 120GB of system RAM plus the 16GB of VRAM writing TBs of data to the 5 internal M2 drives. And I can do so indefinitely with the temps peaking to 100C and limiting to about 300W of power draw. It blasts air out of 3 sides that I could probably cook an egg in. But it doesn't thermal limit after 5 mins of web browsing like the Macbooks or the Airs. It's a beast that is made to beast and it does. Apple can't even compete in the class.
For a tablet, I don't have a need. My phone gives me a giant screen and my tiny auxiliary laptop does everything I need. My aux laptop is beefier than most, but it would be slower than a top of the line mac doing basic tablet things of web browsing. If I did need a tablet I'd just get a Xiaomi Pad. But in general I feel that the entire tablet market is a solution looking for a problem that only exists because Apple and fan bois are idiots again. I've been taking notes on TabletPCs for 20 years now. Seriously, Windows XP had a tablet mode. As did every one after. My laptops have touch input. My laptops in university the screen swiveled and then laid flat on the keyboard with a stylus to write on the screen. All of those fancy new Apple pen features? I had them in 2005. Pressure sensitive, gyro enabled for brush strokes/widths. Eraser on the other end. It was capacitive and needed a proprietary pen which was evil to say then. Now that's Apple motto and they stole the idea and people are believing it's new.
If they release a good product, I'll try it. I'm not brand loyal. If they keep releasing shit, I'm going to keep calling them out.
They are gate keeping
OS and hardware potential to best the best but always something stupid and limiting
Decide what good for me
I’m not an Apple apologist, but I feel there are some things Apple does that are privacy focused.
- The ability to E2EE encrypt iCloud is a very simple privacy feature that is accessible to the technical and non-technical alike.
- Private relay provides a double VPN architecture that doesn’t cause constant captcha hell and again just works for non-technical people.
- Hide my email, while not being perfect, is a pretty straightforward method to make throwaway email addresses.
The things I hate about Apple are generally not privacy related.
- They are a mega-corporation that stifles innovation
- They don’t allow other browsers
- They are puritanical about what is allowed in the App store
In terms of privacy? What's the alternative? I'm sure that stock Android phones are way way worse in terms of privacy than any Apple device ever made.
Android is great in theory but the amount of pre-installed garbage, material design and Google / vendor powered spyware is way too much for my liking. I’m not saying that Apple doesn’t track things, because they do, but at least there’s no vendor garbage and you can go through the Settings and disable everything you don’t need, restrict Apps from running in the background etc. If you don’t upload your data into iCloud it will be way more private than the average Android phone.
Another thing I dislike about non-Apple phones is that, besides the Pixel and a few others, their bootloader and storage security is a joke, if someone gets your device you can assume they’ll get to your data.
GrapheneOS is great, it would be the one and only alternative to the mess that Android is however I can't daily drive that as it lacks features (nice things) I do want to have.
I hate apple so much.
I really hate Iphones.Iphone, Iphone,
I fucking hate it
I hate it so much
I want to beat it wtih a stickIt's such a slow-ass,
buggy piece of shit,
and everyone who works for Apple
can suck my fucking dickI want to punch it in the face
and shoot it in the head
and run it over with a steamroller
over and over, until it's fucking deadI'm going to dig up Steve Jobs
and Piss on his bones
Because fuck him and everyone
with their stupid fucking Iphones.
